


Somehow, Somewhere, Someway

by firefly124



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Canonical Character Death, F/F, Fix-It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-14
Updated: 2015-09-14
Packaged: 2018-04-20 19:28:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4799522
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/firefly124/pseuds/firefly124
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jo’s about had it with their crappy dorm and so has Charlie.  When Gabriel Novak’s Fortune 500 company offers off-campus housing and a free ride for one year to any team of two people who can successfully complete a set of challenges, she’s all for it.  There’s just a couple of problems.  The challenges are weird, and the stress of trying to complete them in the middle of finals is triggering some really horrifying dreams, not just for her but Charlie too.  Horrifying dreams that seem entirely too real, but couldn’t possibly be.  Could they?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Somehow, Somewhere, Someway

**Author's Note:**

> Please go see [Isis McGee](http://isis-mcgee.livejournal.com)'s awesome [art post](http://isis-mcgee.livejournal.com/3062.html) and give her some love. Thank you, for making such awesome art for this fic! Also, my apologies for truncating the dividers. I've tried tinkering with the code, but they still cut off. Please see the much better originals on Isis McGee's post.
> 
> Huge thanks, also, to [laiksmarei](http://laiksmarei.tumblr.com) for beta-reading despite being in the midst of Major Life Stuff (and sick). You rock, woman. 
> 
> Title courtesy of Kenny Wayne Shepherd's [song by the same name](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80UZXovVqCU).

The air tasted of sweat. Attempts to blow her hair out of her face failed to move the strands plastered against her skin, and Jo’s hand was getting sweaty as she gripped the flashlight. Weren’t computers supposed to be kept cold anyway? And super-clean? No way this dorm room qualified. Not that the Roadhouse had, so maybe computer geniuses had an exception clause somewhere.

“You want to tell me why we’re doing this again?” Jo demanded as she shoved a stray lock of hair out of her eyes with her free hand.

“Hold still!” Charlie snapped as she ... did whatever it was she was doing. It looked about as confusing as one of Ash’s inventions, which figured, considering the goal. “I’ve almost got it.”

Jo huffed. This was so not her thing at all. Couldn’t this have been a race? Or a trial by combat? Something? Anything other than freaking computers? Charlie was adorable when she was concentrating like this, though. That was probably one of the only reasons Jo hadn’t given up on this nonsense already.

Charlie remained hunched over her work, her necklace flung around so the pendant was at the back of her neck and wouldn’t dangle into her way. Jo smiled as it caught her eye, glinting where it lay on Charlie’s pink t-shirt.

“Got it!” Charlie yelled with a grin.

Jo looked down at the plate of metal covered with wires and ... other bits of metal ... as she clicked the flashlight off and set it down. “If you say so.”

“I do,” Charlie insisted. “And I couldn’t have done it without you.”

Next thing Jo knew, she was being kissed, and oh yes, this was what made going along with this all worth it. She pulled Charlie in close and deepened what started out as a celebratory peck, burying one hand in Charlie’s silky red hair and using the other to bring her hips closer. She tasted of the coffee she’d been drinking for the last six hours and the chocolate donut Jo had had to practically force her to eat. Charlie went with it at first, then pulled back. Jo pouted.

“That is so not working on me,” Charlie said. 

Jo raised an eyebrow as she slid her hand down to Charlie’s neck and brought the pendant around to hang properly. She ran her thumb over the design absently before smoothing it into place and letting her hand fall to her side.

“It’s not!” Charlie insisted, even as she reflexively reached for and smoothed down Jo’s matching pendant.

They were such completely cheesy dorks.

Jo twirled a lock of her own hair around a finger and tried to look innocent.

“Don’t even think about going all Romanoff on me,” Charlie said, narrowing her eyes. “I still have to write the actual translation program.”

“You mean this thing ...”

“Motherboard.”

“... doesn’t work yet?”

Charlie sighed and gave her a lopsided smile. “Did you really think it could be that easy?”

“Easy?” Jo asked with a sniff. “You call that easy?”

“Like escaping the Death Star with only scratches easy,” Charlie agreed. “So why don’t you go fly this ship for awhile and I’ll ... yeah, they didn’t really do much with the programming on-screen.”

Jo laughed and gave her another quick peck on the lips. “Fine. But you’re eating a real meal once I get it made.”

“Long as I can eat it one-handed,” Charlie said as she snapped the shell of the laptop over the motherboard and started screwing it back together. 

“Yeah, okay,” Jo said with a sigh. Once Charlie got going on a project like this, there was no stopping her. Jo should’ve known better than to even tell her about it. She grabbed some ingredients from the mini-fridge and headed out to the floor’s kitchenette to throw something together.

Her phone rang just before she reached the counter. Bread, deli meat, and mini carrots threatened to make a break for it as she hurriedly set them down only to scowl at her phone when she saw who it was. With a sigh, she accepted the call.

“Calling to gloat?” she asked.

“Now, why would I do that?” Dean asked. “Just because I have the smartest partner on campus ...”

“Oh, you so don’t,” Jo replied with a grin. “I mean, don’t get me wrong. Your brother’s not exactly stupid, but Sam’s no Charlie either.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” Dean said with a chuckle. “Just know that we’re winning this thing. Computers aren’t everything, you know.”

“Never said they were.” Jo bit her lip. It was kind of obvious that’s the route she and Charlie would’ve taken for this first challenge. She pulled at a drawer to get at the utensils inside and the front of it came off in her hand. She bent over and looked inside to see if she could still find what she needed. “Anyway, we’re the ones getting out of this sorry excuse for a dorm with full rides for our last year while you guys come back to—”she looked at the drawer-front again and set it down in disgust“—these pathetic buildings.”

“You keep telling yourself that,” Dean retorted. 

“Whatever. Trying to cook, here, Dean,” Jo said as she finally pulled a butter knife out of the hole where the drawer belonged. She rinsed it in the sink for good measure before sticking it in the jar of mustard. “So if you’re fishing for clues, you can stop wasting my time. In fact, if all you’re gonna do is trash talk, you can stop wasting my time.”

“You didn’t always think I was a waste of your time,” he said, and Jo could just hear the smirk over the phone.

“Learned a lot since freshman year. What can I say?” Jo couldn’t help a small smile. Freshman year had been fun. Mostly. She wasn’t quite the party animal Dean was, though, so that relationship had been pretty much doomed from the get-go. Things might’ve been different if they’d met last year instead, once he’d settled a little. A little. But she still would’ve met Charlie last year and ... yeah. 

Jo wedged the phone against her shoulder as she slathered mustard onto the roast beef she’d laid out on the bread, wincing as she did. As far as she was concerned, whether you used mustard or mayo, it went on the bread, not the meat. It just looked weird. Charlie swore by it, though, so that’s what she was going to get. That way maybe she’d at least eat it. If it weren’t for her shoulder starting to cramp, Jo would’ve have forgotten she was on the phone.

“Not much, apparently.” Dean huffed into the phone. “Anyway, if you two are gonna be done with stuff, wanna meet us at the Roadhouse later? Sammy’s buying.”

“Hey!” Jo heard Sam yell in the background.

“I don’t know. Maybe.” Jo almost shrugged, but she’d have lost the phone, so she stopped herself. “Text me when you get there?”

“Yeah, okay. Oh, and Jo?”

“Yeah?”

“You’re the ones still gonna be living in this dump next year.” 

Jo pulled the phone away from her ear and scowled at it before shoving it in her pocket. She cut the sandwich in quarters and made an “X” of baby carrots running between the pieces. Making boring food look interesting had definitely become a university survival skill. She cleaned the knife and the counter, then shoved the drawer-cover back on the drawer. No sense leaving it open for whatever to get in there. Maybe she’d borrow some of Dean’s tools and fix it later. She scowled when she noticed the mustard on her favorite purple top. That’d be a bitch to get out.

Charlie barely looked up from what she was doing, but she did pick up one of the baby carrots and pop it in her mouth. Once she crunched it, she shot Jo a wounded look.

“Healthy stuff?”

“Motivation,” Jo said as she shrugged out of her top and tossed it in the laundry basket before fishing a clean one out of the closet. “You finish, we go meet the boys at the Roadhouse for booze and junk food.”

“Fine,” Charlie sighed. She bopped her Hermione bobblehead and turned her attention back to the computer.

Jo chuckled. Yeah, that was about right. She grabbed her economics textbook and plopped down on her bed. Might as well get ready for tomorrow’s quiz.

The jukebox was blasting something Jo vaguely recognized but wasn’t particularly impressed with. Sometimes she wondered why they hung out here. The Roadhouse was kind of a dive. She’d never tell her mother that though.

“How can you even drink those?” Dean asked, beer in hand. He was wearing that stupid red shirt again. Seriously, were red and green the only colors he owned? At least he never wore them together.

“Hey, the Harvey Wallbanger is a classic, I’ll have you know,” Charlie retorted before taking a hearty gulp.

“It’s a chick drink,” Dean said with a snort. 

“Well, I am a chick,” Charlie pointed out. “Also, can I just say, the Purple Nurple is not exactly the epitome of the manly-man drink, but you seemed to be downing them just fine last week.”

“Hey, it worked, didn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Sam said with a laugh, “if by ‘worked’ you mean ‘got so drunk you forgot all about the chick you were drinking them to impress.’” 

Dean looked confused.

“Dean, honey,” Jo said, giving him her best understanding friend look, “were you under the impression you scored that night?”

“What? No!” He scowled. “No ... I ... yes?”

“Drunken hallucinations don’t count,” Sam said, pointing at his brother with his own beer. Condensation dripped off it onto the scratched-up table, which he mopped up with his sleeve. Seriously, who wore long-sleeved plaid in this weather?

“Y’all suck,” Dean said with a pout.

For some reason, they all thought that was hilarious, and after a minute even Dean was laughing. 

“So,” Sam finally said, “you ladies make any progress on your project?”

“Ready to venture forth where no one has gone before,” Charlie said, “with all aliens speaking contemporary American English. You?”

“Ready to take on the UN,” Dean said.

“You do realize that sounds more like we’re planning terrorism than figuring out how to talk to all of them, right?” Sam asked.

“Whatever.” Dean took another pull of his beer.

“What do you think the next challenge is gonna be?” Jo asked.

“Whatever crazy thing Novak thinks of when he wakes up,” Dean replied. “Gabe’s twisted.”

“But conveniently eccentric enough to run contests with prizes like off-campus housing and full scholarships,” Sam pointed out. “Twisted or not, he got us to play along.”

“What I want to know,” Charlie said, “is why he even wants people inventing this stuff. I mean, Google Translator exists. Why reinvent the wheel?”

“Because he’s nuts?” Dean offered. “Besides, nobody said it had to be a computer. Maybe he’s planning on setting off a massive electro-magnetic pulse that’ll wipe out all the computers but still wants to be able to talk to people?”

“Dude, you’ve been watching that stupid show again, haven’t you,” Sam said with a groan.

“What? It was a cult classic, and who doesn’t like watching Jessica Alba run around in a catsuit?”

“Nobody at this table,” Charlie replied with a grin. “But if someone’s got a marathon going and didn’t tell me, I’mma be pissed.”

Jo raised an eyebrow at her and got a kiss in response.

“Hey,” Charlie said, “still got eyes. Besides, you get to check out _both_ Max _and_ Alec. Twice, if you count Ben.”

“Fair point,” Jo said with a shrug. “But sci-fi dystopias aside, it is a good question. That’s a helluva prize to offer for stuff that makes no sense.”

“Maybe the next task will make it clearer,” Sam offered. “Like, maybe this is his way of outsourcing his next big invention.”

“Isn’t outsourcing supposed to make things cheaper?” Jo asked dubiously. “Two free rides to Stanford with off-campus housing, even just for a year, isn’t exactly chump change. Not that his company can’t afford it, but still.”

“Compared to hiring big-name developers?” Sam asked. “Maybe it is.”

“Has anybody heard anything about the other teams?” Charlie asked.

“Everybody’s being pretty hush-hush,” Sam said. 

“That dick Cassie teamed up with has plenty to say,” Dean grumbled. “Stuck-up jackass.”

“Yeah, Dean,” Sam said, “we know. Fergus Macleod of the Clan Macleod is a pretentious asshole. But none of the shit he says actually gives any indication what they’re doing. They could be replicating the Rosetta Stone on granite tablets for all we know.”

“Now there’s an idea ...” Dean said thoughtfully.

“No, no there isn’t.” Sam glared at his brother. “Not a chance.”

“Meg and Ellie are probably the best-positioned team for this task anyway,” Jo pointed out. “Far as we know, they’re the only team with at least one bilingual person on-board. And no, Sam, freshman Spanish doesn’t really count.”

“You do realize we have to learn a lot of Latin in pre-law, right?”

“Because dead languages are soooo useful.”

“They are when they have so much influence on modern languages.”

“But nobody actually needs ...”

“Children!” Charlie said, hands raised. “Do I have to send you to the time-out corner, where, may I remind you, there is no alcohol?”

Jo snapped her mouth shut.

So did Dean.

Sam shrugged but took a pull of his beer.

“Thank you,” Charlie said. “After all, it’s a given that Jo and I are going to win this.”

“Now who’s getting cut off?” Dean asked with a huff.

Charlie just winked at him.

Jo sighed.

Jo bounced nervously on the balls of her feet and watched as Gabriel examined each of the entries. The hall was filled with a light buzzing as everybody commented on the various interpretations people had made of his bizarre instructions. Charlie was as bad as everyone.  
Jo tried to shift her attention to the rows of portraits of people who were probably important at some point, or the plaques that probably described what they had done that was such a big deal. Hey, maybe if they won this thing, they’d get a portrait and a plaque! That’d break up the old guy monotony anyway.

 

“They seriously went the carved-in-stone route? Please,” Charlie scoffed. “I mean, okay, sure, Rosetta Stone’s a thing, but what about functionality?”

“Ours is the best,” Jo said staunchly. Because seriously, nobody else had written a translation program, never mind built the computer for it from scratch. There were code books and flash cards and, yes, stone tablets, apparently. She was a little concerned that the instructions hadn’t actually said whatever they came up with had to be user-friendly, and Gabriel was just weird enough that he could seriously choose anything and nobody would be surprised. For example, he was judging this contest with a lollipop hanging out of his mouth. What CEO of a major corporation does that?

“He’s spending a lot of time on that deck of cards you guys made,” Charlie said.

“It’s not a ...” Sam stopped himself. “They’re reference cards you could carry in your wallet with key phrases from most major languages.”

“On every card?” Jo asked.

“Nah, there wouldn’t be room,” Dean replied. “Each one has a different pair of languages, depending on what you speak and where you’re going.”

“Huh,” Jo said. That actually did sound pretty useful for travelers, if that was even who this invention was really for.

Charlie elbowed her in the ribs. “I think he’s decided.”

Gabriel picked up the microphone and broke into a grin, popping the lollipop out of his mouth. The crowd grew quiet.

“Wow,” he said, “you guys sure don’t disappoint. We’ve got everything here from the stone age to the information age!”

The general buzz in the room picked up for a few seconds and then died back down.

“You all obviously put a ton of work into these, but I can only pick one. So ...” he trailed off theatrically.

“Ugh, come on already!” Charlie muttered.

“The top point for this round go to ... team 5 for their fantastic codex! And I do mean fantastic. Kudos for including Theban and Enochian, but what possessed you to include Klingon?”

Jo put an arm around Charlie’s shoulders. The rest of the announcement was pretty much of a blur, though she did manage to hear that she and Charlie and taken second place. Sam and Dean took third for theirs, apparently, and Meg and Ellie were shockingly out of the running.

“You’re just sore about Victor and Bela getting that round,” Jo said as she opened the door to their room.

“I am not,” Charlie retorted. “There’s just no way that some bunch of folded cardboard with imaginary languages on it, no matter how cool, is better than my universal translator. Besides, I looked. No Elvish.”

Oh yes, this was shaping up to be an epic sulk. If it got bad enough, Charlie might end up literally depressed and back on the, “I don’t belong in college anyway” train. There was no way Jo was going to let that happen.

“No accounting for Gabriel. We knew he was pretty out there,” Jo added quickly. “And we did take second, so we’ve still got enough points to keep going.”

“How?” Charlie asked. “Seriously, what does Gabriel Novak want with a ‘mythological flying artifact’?”

“Who cares?” Jo asked. “I mean, okay, yeah, I care because that might give me a clue what the hell is going to win for us, but in the grand scheme? I just care that maybe we win this thing and have a good senior year. On him.”

“Well, unless my _Serenity_ model counts, which he can totally not have because it’s limited edition _and_ signed by Summer Glau, then I have no ideas.”

“What about your Nimbus 3000?” Jo asked innocently, darting her eyes towards the oddly shaped “broom” on the wall. She laughed at the glare that earned her. “Right, fine. So this one’s on me then. Fair enough.”

“Does that mean you have an idea?” Charlie asked.

“I might,” Jo said.

“Care to share with your loving girlfriend?” Charlie took a step closer.

Jo gave her a smile. “I could be persuaded.”

“Mm-hmm.” Charlie looped a finger through one of the loops on Jo’s jeans and pulled her closer. “And just what kind of persuading did you have in mind?”

Jo leaned back just a bit. “Oh, I think you know.”

Charlie grinned and gave another tug on Jo’s jeans. “Would it involve getting rid of these?”

“Eventually,” Jo replied. “Like the man said, ‘If you want to kiss the sky, better learn how to kneel.’”

“And if I want to kiss you?”

Jo pretended to think that over for a second before leaning in to kiss Charlie. Charlie deepened the kiss immediately, and Jo gave an internal cheer. Charlie was well and truly distracted from her sulk, and in the most enjoyable way possible.

Now to come up with an actual idea while being equally distracted.

It was one of the gravestones in the cemetery near the school that got Jo’s attention finally. She’d pitched a handful of ideas, every one of which Charlie had shot down. The problem was the basic parameters of the task. By definition, whatever they came up with was mythological, so the best they could do was mock something up. Something that would never fly.

Not like a big chunk of stone was going to fly either, but something about it stuck in her brain. Jo decided to go bother Dean at work.

A wave of aromas laced with spices and chocolate over a rich blend of coffees greeted Jo as she opened the door to the usual crowd. At least Dean’s break was due soon, or so she thought. He was five cups-of-varying-sizes deep behind the espresso machine, but his boss was pretty good about covering so people got their breaks. Sure enough, when Jo was two people away from the front of the line, Garth came out of the office and tapped Dean on the shoulder. With a smile, Dean held up two cups and gave Jo a wink. She should’ve known he’d notice she was waiting.

She stepped out of the line and followed Dean to the break room. Garth was pretty cool about friends going back there as long as people were actually on break and didn’t come back late. Jo took the vanilla latte (extra vanilla and a dash of cinnamon) from Dean and sat across from him at the rickety table that had been retired from the customer area.

“So,” he asked after taking a swig of whatever mocha-smelling thing he’d made for himself but would never cop to, “what brings you in? Miss me that much?”

“You wish,” Jo scoffed. 

“Hey, watch it,” he said. “I’ll have to cancel your tab.”

Jo rolled her eyes. They both knew that would never happen. It was half the reason she didn’t come in too often anymore. It was one thing to let her boyfriend put her coffees on the tab that got deducted from his paycheck. It was a completely different thing to let her ex-boyfriend do that, at least on a regular basis.

“I was just wondering if you’d made a move on that guy you’ve been eying all semester,” Jo said right as Dean took a mouthful of coffee.

Impressively, he didn’t spit it everywhere, even if he did choke a little and spill some coffee on his apron.

“What the hell are you talking about?” he demanded, grabbing a napkin and scrubbing at the apron.

“You know exactly who I’m talking about,” she replied. “Messy hair, blue eyes, perky ass.”

“Still don’t know who you mean,” Dean said, “but I’m starting to think _you’ve_ been eying this guy.”

Jo gave him a withering look. “Castiel, you idiot. What, you think nobody notices the way you stare at him in class?”

“Cas?” Dean asked not at all convincingly. His attention was suddenly riveted on his coffee. “No way.”

Jo stared him down.

“Fine,” Dean admitted. “I may possibly have sort of noticed him on occasion. But if you think I’m making a move on Gabe’s brother in the middle of this ...”

“He’s Gabe’s brother?” Jo asked innocently. 

“Yeeeah,” Dean said. 

“They don’t look alike,” Jo pointed out. 

“I dunno, maybe they’re adopted.” Dean shrugged.

“So, what, you think Gabe would be all offended you were sullying his family’s virtue or something?”

“Have you seen Gabe?” Dean asked, incredulous. “I don’t think he knows how to spell virtue. I mean, sure, their dad’s some kind of minister or something, but I’m pretty sure none of that rubbed off on Gabe. Cas, on the other hand ...”

“Is one of those ‘still waters run deep’ types,” Jo finished for him before he could talk himself out of this. “So, I repeat my question: when are you going to make a move?”

Dean took another gulp of his coffee. “Maybe after this is all over. When it doesn’t look like I’m trying to use him.”

“Ah.” Jo nodded. “Good point.”

“So this is why you came in here today?” Dean asked. “Why are you suddenly interested in my love life?”

“You know how people get when they’re in good relationships,” Jo said with a smile. “Kind of want all their friends to be too, y’know?”

“Yeah, right.” Dean looked at her suspiciously. “You’re up to something.”

“Me?” she asked. Jo could tell by the look on his face that her innocent act was not faring much better than his had.

“Yeah, you.” Dean frowned, then tossed back the rest of his coffee and pitched the cup at the trash can. “Whatever. Got just about enough time to let that out the other end before I’ve gotta get back.”

“Thanks for sharing that,” Jo said with a roll of her eyes. “I should get going anyway too. I’m kinda hurt though, that you find it so unbelievable that I want you to be happy.”

Dean just shook his head and waved as he headed into the rest room. Jo picked up her latte and went back out through the coffee shop. Once she got outside, she took a moment to think about what he’d said and decided another walk past the cemetery was in order. 

“Definite religious influence,” she murmured when she reached it. She set her cup on the stone wall that ran along the sidewalk and looked at the delicately carved angel standing above one of the graves. “I wonder.”

“Not that I don’t get it, because I totally get it,” Charlie said, “but shouldn’t they be, like, white? Or maybe gold or something?”

Jo pushed a lock of hair out of her eyes with her forearm, trying to make sure she didn’t end up getting glue in it. More glue in it. She squinted up at Charlie.

“I told you, I couldn’t find enough of them. I’m lucky I found enough in black. And there is no way in _hell_ that I’m spray-painting these damned things.” She held up the feather she was about to glue in place and ran a finger along its soft vane. “Yeah, that’d end badly.”

“Oh ye of little faith,” Charlie said as she flopped down into the pile of grungy orange fabric and stuffing that passed for a couch. Secrecy was all well and good, but they needed room to work on this, so they’d taken over the dorm’s lounge. “If we were in Moondoor, we could totally pull it off.”

“Well, Moondoor’s on hiatus until next summer, so ... yeah. Not so much.” Jo carefully lined up the next feather on the framework she’d built and held it in place for a few seconds to encourage it to stick. “Besides, I IM’d one of your cosplayer people while you were in class. She’s the one who helped me figure out how to get these to actually stay, short of sewing them on.”

“I don’t get it,” Charlie said. “I mean, I get it, but I don’t get it.”

“Yeah, that totally clarified what you meant.” Jo chuckled and grabbed another black goose feather.

“I mean, I get that you’re going for angel wings. But there’s no way those can fly ... which is probably true of anything anybody else comes up with.”

“Exactly,” Jo said. “Once I gave up on making something that would actually fly and just followed the damn directions, it all got a lot easier.”

“And you picked angel wings because ...?”

“Because a guy with a name like Gabriel who creates stupid challenges like this should appreciate the irony,” Jo said, sitting back on her heels to look over her creation. She thought it was pretty good, actually. And something that was more up her alley than Charlie’s, though that did sort of take the teamwork out of it. “So, you gonna get down here and help me or what?”

“I thought you’d never ask!” Charlie bounded up off the tattered couch and came over to join her, picking a spot where more feathers clearly needed to go but they wouldn’t be right on top of each other. “So, what’s the trick?”

“Just keep them facing all the same way and glue them with this stuff.” Jo held up the bottle of fabric glue.

“Sounds easy enough.”

“Yeah,” Jo said with a wry laugh as she grabbed her next feather, “it does.”

“You know,” Charlie said, “maybe the queen needs wings. She could be part fairy.” Charlie looked thoughtful and fell quiet for a minute.

“Penny for your thoughts,” Jo finally asked when it seemed like Charlie had gone someplace else. 

“What?” She shook her hair, red curls dancing around her face. “Oh. Sorry. Just ... flashed back to a dream I had for a second there.”

“You actually dream about your LARP game?” Jo asked, raising an eyebrow. 

“Sometimes? Fortunately, the actual game doesn’t get anywhere near as exciting as my dreams.”

Jo took a second to try to figure out how to respond to that, then gave up and got back to work. They only had a few more hours to get this project done, anyway, and these wings still needed time to dry.

“Sandals, Sam?” Jo asked. “Seriously, what were you thinking?”

She planted herself in the booth and put her arm around Charlie when she joined her.

“That’s what I asked,” Dean muttered as he took another swig of his beer.

“Hermes sandals,” Sam retorted pointing to the tiny wings on them. “They are actual mythological flying artifacts. _Artifacts._

“That’s why you were grilling me about the Novaks, isn’t it?” Dean asked.

“You were grilling Dean about the Novaks?” Charlie asked.

“Not grilling,” Jo said with a huff. She took a swig of her beer, then winced at how flat it tasted. She made a mental note to tell her mom, then scratched it out when she realized that meant she’d be the one changing the keg. “Asking. And ... I just wondered, what with the names they gave their kids, if they were religious.”

“Because you wanted to know if angel wings would win,” Dean said. “I knew there was something off about that whole conversation.”

“And yet you answered me,” Jo replied with a smirk.

“At least we placed better than Mcleod and Cassie,” Sam cut in. “A Pegasus? Really?”

“I actually think they got robbed,” Charlie said. “Their Pegasus looked way better than Victor and Bela’s dragon. Face it, Sam, you’re the only one who got that literal with the ‘artifacts.’”

“But still placed second,” he countered. “So we could still totally catch up to you guys.”

Jo raised an eyebrow at him.

“Gals?” he tried.

“Better,” she said. “And actually, even though both our teams have the highest points of everybody, there are so many points for this last bit, I think it could still be anybody’s game.”

“I did the math,” Charlie said. “Sadly, you’re right.”

“And what exactly are we supposed to be creating, here?” Dean asked. “I mean, I’m fresh out of DeLoreans.”

“That doesn’t even fit,” Sam scoffed. “That only travels in time. In the movie. Which is not real.”

“Neither are angels or Gods with winged sandals,” Charlie pointed out. “Weird that two things have to do with travel though.”

“One through the air and one between dimensions,” Sam said. “Plus the translator thing. Does seem to be a theme.”

“Wardrobe?” Jo suggested. 

“Or Stargate, maybe,” Charlie agreed. “Those are kind of obvious though.”

“If the reason he’s asking for this stuff is to brainstorm some kind of movie idea, which is about all the clue I have,” Dean said, “maybe we need to stay away from the stuff that’s been done. I mean, the point is to invent something, right?”

“Everything’s been done, Dean,” Sam said. 

“Well, yeah,” Charlie replied, “but maybe the point is to come up with a new twist.”

“You have an idea,” Jo said, watching Charlie’s gaze go unfocused.

“Like ... twelve percent of an idea,” Charlie muttered. Her left hand drifted to her pendant as her voice trailed off.

“We don’t have to all stand up, do we?” Dean asked.

“Shut up, Dean,” Jo and Sam replied in unison.

Sam looked like he was getting an idea too. He tossed back the last of his beer before letting the bottle clink to the table and grabbing his jacket.

“Where are you going?” Dean asked.

“Tell you on the way,” he replied. “See you later, ladies. After we win this.”

“You wish,” Jo called after him. She took another sip of her beer before giving it up as a lost cause. “Penny for your thoughts now the boys are gone.”

“Do you still have any of that wire you used to make the wing frames?” Charlie asked.

“Uh, no, but I can get some more. Why?”

“To build a tunable inter-dimensional portal that only in the vaguest sense resembles a Stargate,” Charlie replied.

“I knew I was going to regret asking.” Jo sighed.

Everything hurt. Well, everything except her legs. That couldn’t be good, and she pointed that out to the rest of them. It was sweet that they wanted to get her out of here, but she probably wouldn’t have much chance even if they were already in an emergency room. Hellhound bites weren’t exactly taught in med school. For all they knew, they were poison.

It took a bit to get the rest of them on board, but they finally listened and got to bomb-building. It was a good plan. Very T2. Right up until her mother decided to stay. Once the guys left, Jo tried again to convince her to go.

“Not a chance,” her mother said. “I will not leave you alone.”

She wouldn’t listen, and Jo was running out of energy to fight her. Everything was starting to get dark. One way or another, they had to get this show on the road.

Chains rattled as her mother removed them from the doors, and Jo could hear her sweeping through the salt line with her foot. It felt like she was floating, and she couldn’t open her eyes at all, but Jo felt her mother press a kiss to her head and slip something cool and metallic around her neck.

“You can go right to hell, you ugly bitch!” her mother said fiercely.

Jo woke up sticky with sweat. Charlie was shaking her shoulder.

“It’s just a dream, baby, wake up,” she was saying.

“I’m awake.” Jo turned onto her back and looked up at Charlie, who was leaning over her, propped up on one elbow. Her eyes caught the light filtering in the dorm window, but even though they sparkled, they couldn’t hide how worried she was.

“That’s the third time this week,” Charlie said as she brushed Jo’s hair out of her face. 

“So I’m what, one up on you?” Jo asked.

“Not the point,” Charlie said. 

“Actually, it kind of is,” Jo said. She pushed herself up to sitting, then reached over and touched Charlie’s necklace where it lay just above the neckline of her t-shirt. She traced the eight-pointed star and then touched each of the different circles surrounding and inside it. “I know you don’t want to talk about yours, and I definitely don’t want to talk about mine, but ... does this factor in at all?”

Charlie’s eyes widened. “How did you know?”

“Because mine does too.” 

Charlie sat up too then. “That’s ... freaky.”

“Kinda,” Jo agreed. 

“So,” Charlie said, “we both start having nightmares at the same time. We’re stressing over the combination of finals and this contest, right? So no big.”

“Right.”

“But both of us are having nightmares that have to do with these? That’s some Hogwarts-level weird.”

“Well, Stanford does look kinda castle-y,” Jo added with a chuckle. She wasn’t really feeling the humor of it though. Clearly neither was Charlie, as all that got from her was a glare.

They were both quiet for a few minutes.

“Have you ever looked up what it means?” Jo asked. “I mean, we know it’s supposed to be good luck, but nobody’s ever said why.”

“No, I haven’t,” Charlie replied. “That’s weird, right? I mean, it’s not like it’s hard. But ... even though that sounds like a really good idea, I kind of don’t want to.”

“Same kind of ‘don’t want to’ as for talking about the dream?” Jo asked.

Charlie thought about it for a second, then nodded. She turned and grabbed her tablet off the nightstand and held it up in front of her.

“What are you doing?” 

Charlie turned the tablet around so that Jo could see the picture Charlie had just taken. A close-up of the necklace, with the v-neck of Jo’s shirt barely visible.

Without another word, Charlie started tapping and swiping, and Jo could tell she was deep in thought. Usually, even when she was busy on something, Charlie kept up a fairly steady stream of chatter. But not when she was focused on solving a puzzle.

“You can’t be serious,” Charlie muttered.

“What?”

“Pinterest? That’s the main hit?”

“Isn’t that the recipe site?” Jo asked.

“Pretty much. But ...” Charlie’s voice shifted slightly, “apparently the octagram is a symbol of protection, and each of the circles represents the elements of earth, air, fire, water, and spirit.”

“Okay,” Jo said, “but what does that even mean?”

“It’s a soul-protection sigil. We’re wearing friggin’ horcruxes. Or, maybe more like anti-horcruxes.”

“Sweetie, you can start making sense anytime now,” Jo said. “We haven’t gone around killing people and splitting up our souls. Pretty sure I’d remember a thing like that.”

“Same way you don’t remember where you got the necklace?” Charlie asked. “Same way I don’t?”

Jo didn’t have an answer for that.

“In my dream,” Charlie said, “some douche-nozzle’s about to break into the bathroom I’m hiding in. He has to be major-league bad, because I just smashed the crap out of my laptop.”

“Um, why?” Jo asked.

“So he couldn’t get what was on it,” she replied. “Whatever it was. Anyway, that still doesn’t tell me where I _got_ the necklace, but the last thing before he breaks in and I wake up, I remember grabbing onto it and thinking, ‘This had better work.’”

Jo swallowed a couple of times before she could talk again. “So you wake up right before dream-you dies.”

“Yeah.” Charlie made a face. “And I feel like I want to throw up from saying any of that. But I’m not going to.”

Jo considered explaining her dream and felt a similar wave of nausea. “Sooo ... we’re both completely nuts? Because otherwise, I’m gonna start freaking out.”

“Well, they’re dreams, right?” Charlie asked. “Not like we’re seeing stuff that isn’t there when we’re awake. Trust me, that’s the stuff that’s hospital-worthy.”

“Um, three in the morning might not be the best time to try to work out what’s real and what’s not,” Jo replied. “But this is all pretty freaky. Right?”

“Or we’re just both weirded out because we’re having stress-dreams and it’s the middle of the night.” Charlie sounded about as convinced as she looked.

“Right.” Jo slowly laid back down but stayed facing Charlie. “Just stress and exhaustion.” 

“Think you can get back to sleep?” Charlie asked. 

Jo wasn’t sure she wanted to. She’d never had the dream twice in a night, but she had no guarantee that she wouldn’t start now. Instead of answering, she snuggled closer to Charlie, who wrapped her arms around her. Jo let herself be tucked under Charlie’s chin and tried to let the warm softness of her embrace lull her back to sleep. 

By five o’clock, they both surrendered and got up for the day.

It was a good thing no one else in their building was in this contest, because this was the second project that got way too big to keep in their room.

“This ... really kind of looks like a Stargate,” Jo said.

“It’s hard to argue with the circular design,” Charlie said. “If we’re using symbols, that just makes more sense than trying to come up with something digital.”

The plaster-of-Paris-over-wireframe “doorway” was on its second coat of paint and the room reeked of it. It had taken some doing to talk Charlie out of using silver. Gold was not quite what Jo’d had in mind though. Still, it was eye-catching, if nothing else, and there was plenty of room to paint the symbols from their necklaces onto it, interspersed with other alchemical symbols for the elements. At least the symbols were going to be out along the rim of it rather than facing front, though Jo wasn’t sure that was “original” enough.

“Okay, but what if we at least lie it flat?” Jo suggested. “Make it less of a doorway and more of a platform.”

“Beam me up, Scotty?” Charlie asked. “Huh. Well, it definitely doesn’t look like a transporter, but that would combine the two ideas.”

“Or we could shrink it way down and make it a ring?” Jo looked at the structure critically. “That would be pretty tough to do though, with all the symbols.”

Charlie sat back on her heels and considered. A slow smile crept across her face.

“What?” Jo asked.

The smile turned into a grin.

“What?” Jo asked again, this time getting a bit nervous.

“We,” Charlie said, “are totally going digital.”

Jo’s eyes felt like they wanted to pop out of her face as she looked at the work they’d done so far. “Soooo ... complete change of plan?”

“Nope,” Charlie said as she picked her paintbrush back up. “First, we finish this. Then, we shrink it.”

Jo shook her head. This would probably make sense eventually, but she wasn’t sure how.

Jo couldn’t believe her eyes when Charlie pulled the finished product out of the 3-d printer. She took it gingerly and held it close to her face. Amazingly, the symbols were all legible. The panel holding them slid easily around the band and clicked slightly each time the symbols lined up with the octagrams on the band.

“Go on,” Charlie said, “try it on.”

“Kinda thought I’d be the one getting you a ring someday,” Jo muttered. “But definitely not like this.”

“You ... what?” Charlie gaped at her for a second, then shook her head. “Never mind. That conversation, we can have later. But, you’re giving me an idea.”

Jo watched as Charlie tapped out a command and the 3-d printer started up again. Jo raised her eyebrows.

“Matching set,” Charlie said. “If you’re going dimension-hopping, there is no way I’m not coming with.”

“Right.” Jo nodded. “Um, so how do these theoretically work?”

“You pick your destination using the translator program, which I added all these symbols to,” Charlie said, her eyes intent on the printer. “Then you dial up where you want to go, put the ring on, and use that hand to open any door. Voila.”

“Voila,” Jo said. Something about that made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. Anticipation, she thought. They were totally going to win this. “So, we’ve got a combination of Narnia, Stargate, and Lord of the Rings?”

“Kinda,” Charlie said. “Pretty sure that’s a combo that hasn’t been done, though.”

“All right.” Jo turned the symbols around the band. “Betting nobody else has come up with it anyway.”

Jo was really starting to hate the over-caffeinated butterflies flapping around her stomach. There was no good reason to be _this_ anxious over whether they’d win. Sure, it’d be awesome to have their own apartment instead of living in crappy dorms for senior year. And yeah, it would be a _huge_ relief to have their final year paid for. But the way she felt about to jump out of her skin, you’d think it was a matter of life and death.

That thought brought with it a flash of a dingy hardware store that made her shudder. Those damned dreams had gotten worse, if anything. Talk about stress!

Gabriel spent a lot of time at each entry’s table. Meg and Ellie had come the closest to Charlie’s and her design, with wristwatches that were supposed to tap into a transporter system somehow. Victor and Bela had gone old-school with a Wellsian machine of some kind. Cassie and Fergus, well, if their design won, then everybody else had gone in completely the wrong direction, because they’d taken the “dimension” thing literally, with a program set up to translate any shape from m-dimensional to n-dimensional using the kind of math Jo’d only ever seen Charlie make sense of. Sam and Dean had finally gone with Dean’s first instinct, though what they’d submitted was a scale-model DeLorian.

Was Novak ever going to decide? Jo squeezed Charlie’s hand tightly. Charlie squeezed back. The chatter in the room was a continuous, grating buzz, but Jo couldn’t be bothered to try and make any of it out. There was only one thing she wanted to hear at this point.

Gabe picked up their rings again and examined the symbols closely. He was going to check everybody’s entries twice, Jo decided, just to keep them all in suspense. Sure enough, he set the rings back down and moved on to the wrist-thingies.

“I can’t take it,” Jo hissed.

“Yes you can,” Charlie whispered back. “We’ve got this.”

Spinning around to face the crowd, Gabe grabbed the mike and said, “Gotta admit, you all got pretty creative here. But the rules are only one team wins, and that team is ...”

Jo stopped breathing.

“Charlotte Bradbury and Joanna-Beth Harvelle!”

Jo wasn’t sure who screeched louder, her or Charlie. They’d done it! They’d really done it! Not just this round, but the whole thing! She turned and kissed Charlie hard.

“We are so outta here,” Charlie said with a grin when she pulled back.

“Yes,” Gabe said, standing surprisingly close to them. “Yes, you are.”

Jo pulled her eyes away from Charlie to glare at him for interrupting their moment. That was probably kind of ungrateful on her part, but come on. Except the glare turned into confusion as she saw that there was nobody left in the hall but them. Just her, Charlie, and Gabe.

“Uh, sweetie?” she asked. “I know we’ve got the whole ‘time stands still when we kiss’ thing going on, but I really didn’t think we were making out long enough for everybody else to leave.”

“Me neither,” Charlie agreed, a quiver in her voice. Her hand slid down Jo’s arm and she interlaced their fingers.

“You weren’t,” Gabe confirmed. “You pulled all the pieces together that we needed, so we didn’t need all the extras.”

“So, what,” Charlie huffed as she squeezed Jo’s hand hard, “you killed the spares? Also, how?”

He sighed. “They were never real.”

Jo took a step back from him, pulling Charlie with her. “You’re insane.”

“No crazier than your lives have been since you got here,” he countered. “Come on, haven’t you figured it out yet?”

“If we say no, does that mean you’ll give us the evil overlord monologue that tells us how to get the hell away from you?” Charlie retorted.

“Well, I do love to hear myself talk,” he replied, pulling a lollipop out of his pocket and peeling the wrapper off.

“Gee, never noticed,” Jo muttered.

“But I was hoping,” he continued as if he hadn’t heard her, “especially considering how brilliant you’ve been with all this, that the two of you would work out at least some of it on your own.”

Jo reflexively touched her necklace with her free hand.

“That’s the key,” he said. “Good, so you at least got part of it. I mean, seriously, what were the odds the two of you would just randomly meet up and have the same weird amulet?”

“Amulet?” Jo asked. The butterflies in her stomach were fast turning to lead. “As in magic?”

“As in,” Gabe replied. “Soul magic, specifically.”

Jo stole a look at Charlie, who looked as pale as she felt.

“Gabriel,” Charlie said softly. “You’re Gabriel. _The_ Gabriel?”

“The one and only!” He took an exaggerated bow. “Now, if you’re starting to remember stuff, then you, at least, should remember that when last Chuckie-baby wrote about me, I was getting ganked by Lucifer.”

“Yeah,” Charlie said. “First time fake, second time not.”

“Second time not-exactly,” he corrected. “I’d been in my little witness protection for centuries, so there was always a backup plan in case anybody found me. So long as they used my actual archangel blade, it would burn out the vessel I’d created and make it look like I was gone, charcoal wings and all, but it would send my grace here.”

Jo looked around the now very nondescript-looking hall. All of the portraits and award plaques had vanished leaving stark off-white walls. “And here is ...?”

“Pocket universe. Nowhere near as interesting as my own, but safe until I could get back.”

“And we ended up here because of these?” Jo asked. 

“I’d made a couple of keys and left them in places that I figured only people with serious know-how or mojo would find them.” He shrugged. “You know, witches, rabbis, Men of Letters, maybe even hunters.”

“So, that’s all real,” Jo said. “All that crap I’ve been dreaming?”

“Yup,” he said with a pop. “I took a peek, and it looks like your mom had dug that up through her contacts once she found out the apocalypse was happening.”

“And me?” Charlie asked with a slightly hysterical giggle. “What, did I find it lying on the side of the yellow brick road? Because that’s even more insane than the rest of this.”

Gabe rolled his eyes. “No, you didn’t find that in Oz. You were really there, by the way, but no. You, my dear, were insane enough to go looking for the _Book of the Damned_. Fortunately, you also had the sense to dig up some protective magic along the way so you wouldn’t end up, well, damned.”

“So ... I knew what it could do? Because in my dream, it felt like I expected it to do something.” She turned to Jo, eyes wide. “Wait a second. That means you’re ... and you ... holy shit!”

“What?” Jo asked.

“I mean ... I know they said the books were real, but I didn’t realize ... of course that means the other characters were real too ... but ... that was such bullshit! You shouldn’t have died like that!”

“Now who’s being creepy?” Jo asked, forcing a laugh to go with it. “Uh, books? Those stupid comics?”

“The Winchester Gospels,” Gabriel put in. “As far as whether you knew what the amulet did, Charlie, probably not exactly. I didn’t leave real clear information lying around. Couldn’t be sure who’d find the things, after all.”

“I need to sit down,” Jo said. Her head was starting to swim with all this. Was she really supposed to believe it? But if not, how had everybody just disappeared?

Something nudged at the back of her legs and made her jump. When she turned to see what it was, though, it was some random easy chair. Neon pink with black swirls all over it. There was another behind Charlie, and when Jo whipped her head back around, she saw Gabe was already sitting in one just like theirs, except his was gold.

“Forgive me,” he said. “Terrible host. Gotta have easy chairs for company.”

“Of course.” Jo nodded, then shook her head. More magic. Magic was real. And she was ... dead? She should probably be more shocked, but she mostly just felt numb.

“Not dead,” Gabe answered. “Not exactly.”

Jo shuddered. She wasn’t really down with having this guy in her head, even if he was an angel. Archangel. Whatever. Dick with wings.

Gabe shrugged. “Moves things along. Anyway, your bodies died, yeah. But that’s the easy part to fix. Your souls came here instead of heaven, so we could all get back out of here.”

“The easy part,” Jo said, Charlie joining her almost in unison.

“Pfft, totally easy!” he repeated. “The hard part is getting back so we can put Humpty and Dumpty back together again. And that’s why I needed you.”

“You, an archangel, needed us?” Charlie asked. 

“Hey, some things need a hobbit’s touch,” Gabe retorted.

“Definitely creepy,” Charlie muttered, then added, “You needed us ‘hobbits’ to invent crazy crap to break out of here?”

“I needed a facsimile of the tablet that translates magic from one universe to another,” he said. “Wings were just a bonus, though an actual angel feather would’ve been handy. And I needed a key to create a portal. Always gotta have three challenges for your heroines.”

“And you couldn’t come up with all that yourself?” Jo asked. She swept a hand to encompass the empty hall. “Why ... all of this?”

“The college world, you two created,” he said. “I had to work within those parameters to get your help. And humans ... you’re just amazingly creative, given the right push.”

Jo nodded without saying another word, just squeezed Charlie’s hand. It was a relief when Charlie squeezed back.

“So ... what happens now?” Charlie asked. “We just ... go back to the life with the monsters and where I didn’t even finish high school?”

Gabe looked at her carefully. “You have free will. Always have. I can’t _make_ you do anything.”

“What happens, then,” Jo asked, “if we decide to stay here?”

“If I leave, and you don’t,” he replied, “this universe won’t stay running indefinitely. At some point it’ll collapse, and you’ll go upstairs.”

That didn’t sound too bad, Jo thought.

“Where we get to go relive our best memories in the Matrix?” Charlie asked. “Sounds better than going _down_ stairs, but not exactly what they cracked it up to be in Sunday school. When I went. That one time.”

“Yeah, well.” Gabe sighed. His eyes were suspiciously bright. “Figuring out what’s what up there and maybe even trying to fix it is kinda on my to-do list. From what I got off you, Charlie, sounds like I don’t have to worry about my big brothers anyway.”

“Uh, wanna fill me in at some point?” Jo asked.

“Nutshell version? Sam and Dean ... well, mainly Sam ... stopped the Apocalypse. Michael and Lucifer are on ice. Raphael didn’t like the new ending and wanted a reboot. Cas lost his damn mind and went full-on Dark Willow but at least stopped Raphael. Whole lotta other crap.” Charlie took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “They never could’ve done that, you know. If you hadn’t bought them a way out of that store. But it never should’ve come to that.”

“Sounds like you were pretty much saving the world too,” Jo said weakly. “Couple of great heroes we are.”

“Hey, you are!” Gabe cut in. “That’s why you found your way here, ya dingbats! The question is, are you up for another round? Because if you’re not, I get it. I do. You have more than earned the right to rest in peace.”

Jo shuddered. She squeezed Charlie’s hand again. “Not sure which one of you I should ask. Seems like you both know how heaven works more than I do.”

“I’ll tell you whatever I can,” Gabe said.

“Would ... would we get to see each other? I mean, would we still be together?” Jo asked. “And my mom? Would I get to see the real her again?”

Gabe sighed.

“Everybody gets their own heaven,” Charlie said. “You might see someone who looks like your mom, or like me. But they’d be like the Sam and Dean here. Not real.”

“That’s about the size of it,” Gabriel said. “Was never sure that was the best way to do it, but Dad seemed pretty set on it. Didn’t want people ending up fighting with their loved ones when they were supposed to be happy. Sometimes people share. Soulmate types.”

Charlie gave Jo’s hand a squeeze. “We’ve never been all that big on doing things by the book.”

“I knew I liked you two!” Gabe said with a grin. “Trust me, if anybody could find a way around our ‘matrix,’ it’s you. The question is still whether that’s what you want to do.”

Jo chewed on her lip as she thought about the possibilities.

“Did you mean what you said yesterday?” Charlie asked.

“Which thing? I said a lot of stuff,” Jo replied.

“When we finished our ... project?” Charlie raised her eyebrows, then turned and shot Gabe a glare. “And no mind-reading.”

He held up his hands, though the smirk on his face suggested he already knew whatever the hell Charlie was talking about. Which ... oh.

“Um, yeah?” Jo offered. “I mean, I figured ... after graduation sometime ...”

“Then I think I know what we need to do.” Charlie had that look in her eyes again. The one that meant a world of trouble that would probably all be worth it.

Jo gulped. “Guess we need to print off a third ring, then.”

“As long as the printer didn’t go poof,” Charlie agreed.

Gabe snapped his fingers and a third ring appeared on the table with the other two.

“And you needed us why?” Jo asked.

“Needed you to bring it all together first with that human ingenuity thing you’ve got going on.”

“Uh huh.” 

Charlie didn’t sound convinced.

“And there may also be a slight issue of needing a human to ride along with,” he continued. “There’s this teensy little problem with archangels flying around in their true form.”

“You mean burning people’s eyes out?” Jo asked. “Yeah. _Teensy_ problem.”

“I just need enough time to scrounge up our respective molecules and reassemble them,” he went on. 

“Is that like the whole ‘being a vessel’ thing?” Charlie asked. “Because I’m not a fan of the ‘drooling husk’ terms and conditions.”

“Oh ye of little faith.” Gabe sighed. “Crap like that happens when angels don’t take care of their vessels. That’s one of the reasons I set it up that I needed two of you to help me. Splits the weight, so to speak. Besides, without bodies, you wouldn’t really be vessels. More like ... aircraft carriers?”

Jo met Charlie’s eyes again. There was nervousness there, sure, but determination too.

“We doing this?” Charlie asked.

“We can jailbreak heaven anytime, right?” Jo answered. “Let’s make some more memories to relive first.”

The concept for the rings had been simple enough. The actual using of them? Not so much.

“I don’t get why this is such a problem,” Charlie muttered as she tapped commands into the translator. “The key to Oz worked on any door.”

“Are we in Oz now?” Gabe asked as he fiddled with the symbol alignments on his ring. “Didn’t think so.”

“You said an actual angel feather would help,” Jo pointed out. “I get that what came here was your ... grace or whatever, but can’t you, I don’t know, make one?”

“In another few hundred years, sure. The whole point was to avoid waiting that long.” He grabbed Charlie’s hand and changed how the symbols on her ring aligned a bit.

“And me building a door out of lumber you manifested is different than you just snapping a door into existence how?” Jo pushed. Her arm was aching from all the hammering.

“That would take at least another century to explain using physics you haven’t even invented yet,” he retorted. “Just be glad at least one of you brought some carpentry know-how. We don’t want to end up in Antarctica. Well, you don’t.”

Jo wasn’t sure whether to laugh at that or not. Was that an actual risk?

“If we did, you could just zap us someplace better, right?” Charlie asked. “Like the Batcave I’m aiming us at?”

“Of course!” Gabe retorted. After a beat, he added, “Eventually.”

Jo decided she really didn’t want to know what that meant. She pounded a final nail into place and stood up. “There, done.”

Gabe came over to look at it. “Nicely done. Now, give me your hand.”

Jo huffed as he slid the symbols around her band yet again.

“You know,” Charlie said, “if I’d known we needed to translate Earth coordinates into symbols, I could’ve made this way easier.”

“Maybe you could’ve, maybe not,” Gabe said. “The important thing is you made it possible.”

She pushed back from the translator. “This should be it then. Coordinates of the safest place on Earth, rendered in ... whatever language these symbols are. I could’ve used something cooler, you know. Like Elvish?”

“Great idea. Why don’t you try that when you’re actually aiming for Middle Earth?” Gabe scoffed.

“Party pooper.” 

“I’ll have you know I’m tons of fun.”

“I know you think so.”

“Children!” Jo finally yelled. “Do I have to send you to your corners?”

“Kinda hard to do if I take away the corners.”

Jo just rolled her eyes. “So, we have a door, we have coordinates. You need to adjust these again?”

Gabe took a look at the computer screen and nodded. He fixed his ring first, then Charlie’s, then Jo’s. With a snap of his fingers, the door Jo had just built was standing upright in a partial wall that hadn’t been there a minute ago.

“Oh, but the wall you can just ... make?” Jo huffed.

“The door’s the real portal,” he explained. “If you’d like, I could draw up the equations that explain why what’s holding it doesn’t matter ...”

“Never mind,” Charlie cut in. “Just glad it’s upright. So we’ll just walk through, not fall, right? Because I’d rather step out onto solid ground rather than land on Dean’s head or something. Again.”

“What?” Jo asked.

Charlie mouthed the word “later” at her. That was going to be one hell of an interesting story.

“No promises,” Gabe said. “Don’t forget, though, you’re not going to have bodies at first.”

“Great, so we’re going to set off every ghost alarm they have at this bunker of theirs,” Jo said with a sigh. 

“Maybe they won’t be home?” Charlie suggested. “They still traveled a lot for hunts last I knew.”

“Do you really think we’re gonna get that lucky?” Jo asked.

“Course we are!” Gabe said. “You’ve got me with you.”

Jo turned to glare at him. From his reaction, Charlie had done the exact same thing.

“Fine. No bets on the boys. So watch out for salt and iron.”

“Not our first time hunting womp-rats,” Charlie retorted. “Except ... I guess this time ... we’re the womp-rats. Anyway, so how are we doing this?”

Gabe held one hand out to each of them. “Gotta be in the middle so you two can split the load.”

“Dude, really?” Jo asked.

“Hey, I’m not the one that went there.”

“Do _I_ have to send _you_ to opposite corners?” Charlie demanded.

“Nobody’s going to any corners! Just, come here.”

Jo took his left hand. Charlie took his right. 

“That leaves you with the free ring-hand, Red,” he said. “So you get to do the honors.”

“Right. So. Here goes,” Charlie said as she reached for the handle.

“Wait!” Gabe yelled.

Charlie pulled her hand back from the door as if she’d been burned.

“Just kidding,” he said with a chuckle. “Go for it.”

“Dick with wings,” Charlie muttered. “Just saying.”

This time, when Charlie reached for it, Gabe kept his mouth shut and Jo held her breath. She watched as Charlie’s fingers tightened around the doorknob and turned. 

When she pulled it open at last, Jo half expected to see the other side of the room they’d been working in. Instead, the door opened to show a dusty road in the middle of what looked like nowhere. She supposed that described most of Kansas pretty well, actually. A hot, dry breeze blew in at them that smelled of dirt and grass.

“Following your lead,” Gabe prompted.

Taking a deep breath, Charlie stepped through, and Jo realized why it was not a good thing to be the last person in this line. As Charlie’s body passed through the door, she stopped looking like … Charlie. Instead, as each part of her crossed the threshold, it turned into exactly the sort of white mist a ghost turned into when it got hit with a salt shell. 

As Gabriel followed, his mist was more blue than white but it stayed connected to Charlie and sort of ... blended with her white mist. It was tempting to plant her feet and stay where she was, nice and corporeal, but Jo let herself be pulled through, focusing mainly on not screaming as Gabe’s blue mist enveloped her hand as it fogged out too. 

The breeze might be hot and dry, but Jo thought she had never felt so cold.

And then they were through.

The landscape looked brighter than it had through the doorway, but it was still pretty nondescript. Other than, of course, the massive building next to them, complete with black 1967 Impala that said yes, the boys were here somewhere.

Jo tried to say something, but that didn’t work too well without a mouth. She felt a wave of concern wash over her that she decided was from Charlie, followed closely by what she could only assume was supposed to be reassurance from Gabriel, but laced with so much smart-ass attitude that it completely failed. There were no obvious signs they’d been noticed, at least. As in no Winchesters barreling out the door with shotguns full of salt.

Their combined blue and white mist seemed to draw in on itself, and if she could put words to the sensation that blew through her, they would be, “Hang on!”

In less time than it would take to blink, they were in the middle of a field, then a seriously distressed hotel of some kind, and finally the ruins of an all-too familiar hardware store in Carthage, Missouri that really should’ve been rebuilt by now. Then they were back next to the Impala, a much dustier looking cloud of mist than they had been before, and everything was stretching weirdly, pulling apart and rearranging. 

Jo’s right shoulder felt like it was attached to her left ankle, then wrenched apart with a fierce tug that should have hurt like hell. Her ribs stretched wide, as if they weren’t attached to each other, then settled together. The cold of the mist evaporated in the dry Kansas heat as she felt herself congeal.

“You could’ve warned us you were going to turn us into taffy!” she thought as loudly as she could. Then coughed, because she’d actually said it. “Wait, what?”

Jo looked down at her hands. Oh, lovely. They looked horrible. She was also wearing the same damned clothes she’d ... died in. Blood and all.

So, from the look of it, was Charlie, and Jo ran to her instinctively looking for what wounds needed to be dealt with first.

“Um, ladies?” Gabe asked.

They turned to look at him. Son of a bitch looked exactly had in that pocket universe. He snapped his fingers at them.

Jo looked down, and the blood was gone. Charlie too. Relief washed through Jo and she cupped Charlie’s face in her hands and kissed her hard.

“Aww, isn’t that sweet!” Gabe said. Jo turned to glare at him, only to find that _now_ the boys had figured out something was going on out here

“Don’t shoot!” she yelled, putting herself in front of Charlie, or at least trying to. Charlie had other ideas and was trying to do the exact same thing.

“Guys, seriously, not ghosts!” Charlie yelled, trying to shove Jo behind her.

Jo yanked her down as Dean fired his shotgun, shocked when nothing seemed to hit either of them.

“C’mon, Deano,” Gabe said. “You’re not still mad about that whole killing you for a hundred Tuesdays thing, are you?”

“You’re not real,” Dean spat out. “The real Gabriel died five years ago during the _last_ apocalypse.”

“Five years?” Jo asked.

“ _Last_ apocalypse?” Charlie asked. “Since when do we need to be learning plurals for ‘apocalypse’?”

“What have you morons done now?” Gabe demanded. 

“Dean,” Sam said. “I think ... that actually kinda sounds like maybe it’s really them.”

“Dude, we don’t know half the shit we’re dealing with anymore,” Dean retorted. “Even if they pass the salt and silver and holy water tests, what if they’re just some new thing the Darkness cooked up?”

“Darkness?” Gabe asked. “ _The_ Darkness? As in the thing that took me and my big brothers to lock away which, oh, right, turned Lucifer into the Devil? That Darkness?”

“I’m starting to think we should’ve gone with the blue pill,” Charlie murmured.

“How, exactly did you ... oh no. Of course.” Gabe sighed. “Sam, could you maybe have tried a little harder to learn a thing or two from that whole eternal Tuesday thing?”

Charlie’s eyes grew wide as she stared at Dean.

“What?” Jo asked.

“It worked,” Charlie said. “Dean, it worked!”

“That is not a good thing!” he yelled back.

“Would somebody please tell me what the hell is going on?” Jo demanded.

“Oh, you’d like that, wouldn’t you,” Dean said with a sneer.

“Dean, if the Darkness created them, manifested them, whatever ... wouldn’t they already know all that stuff?”

“Then it’s an act!”

“No, Dean. It is not.”

“Hey, bro!”

Jo smiled at the new arrival. She’d only known him for two days, but she’d warmed to Castiel quickly. He definitely had a better personality than this brother of his.

“Gabriel,” he said. “You implied at our last meeting that I might see you again. I did not know whether to believe that was truly possible.”

“Well, I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Gabe said, “but if you didn’t think it was possible, then I am truly crushed.”

“Cas,” Dean asked, “is that really them?”

“Yes. I do not believe that the Darkness could effectively replicate human souls, and it certainly could not manifest an archangel’s true form. That really is Jo, Charlie, and Gabriel.”

“And in the nick of time, from the sound of it,” Gabe said. “Seriously, bro. The Darkness?”

“Obviously, we did not know that removing the Mark of Cain from Dean would unleash such a thing,” Castiel said. “There are a number of reasons, in fact, why it seems impossible that such would be the case.”

Jo could see that Dean, at least, wasn’t sold yet. Sam ... looked like he was about to cry. Jo kind of felt like she was too. She laced her fingers with Charlie’s and pulled her close to her side.

“Blue pill’s sounding like a good idea right about now to me too,” she said.

“Yeah. But when have we ever taken the easy way?” Charlie asked. “In either universe?”

“We were _trying_ for easy with the stupid contest,” Jo said. She sighed. “But yeah. Think maybe we can save the day without getting ourselves killed this time?”

Charlie smiled. “Together? We’ll totally kick it in the ass. Somehow.”


End file.
